Up or Down For Real?

It really depends on who you talk to or what sector of trucking, or what type of commodity is hauled. If you talk to drivers or companies that rely solely on spot market freight to stay busy, they will say that there is not a shortage, but a shortage of pay. If you to drivers or companies that have more fire power, have customer based freight, basically megas or smaller companies with mega capabilities, then they will say it's a shortage. To me, that's only because they have so many trucks and not enough drivers to fill them. Even in the latter case, they go through down periods as well. I'd say overall it's a down period in every industry. You had the boom after around or after covid lockdowns. Drivers couldn't move freight fast enough. Folks had to think though.....eventually things were going to get to a point to where it leveled out. The boom was not going to last forever, and things were eventually going to correct themselves. Manufacturers were going to get caught up and people were going to start spending less. As for the truck pay going up, for me it has. To be fair, I've been in the game since 2010. I began making 29 cents per mile. Today, I'm making 58 cents per mile. Companies have raised pay, but the issue isn't so much that, cost of living went up as well. When jobs raise pay, for some reason, every other entity feels the need to make things more expensive. Me personally, I constantly have to make adjustments to keep my expenses level and under control. Folks need to understand trucking is goof money, but by the same token, you ain't gonna get rich driving trucks, especially if you have a family and a lot of obligations.

 

People are more than just consumers. Some of them are producers and some of them produce much much more than others. Look at productivity and look at consumption. When consumers are happy & confident they spend more than when they are fearful & uncertain. I find it's better to read what the people that make a living monitoring productivity & consumption say than relying on non-experts who may only live, work, experience life in a few areas or never ever consider things beyond the next thing at the moment. Who's prediction about a sporting event is better supported, the stats nerd or the fan that watches 4 games per year?

Even if you got the correct answers to your questions you won't know they are correct until it happens. Make your self more valuable, flexible, less dependent on things never changing. Then adjust as needed.

 

I have the same dilemma where I work.
If they book me for a 8 hour day I will gross around 300 bucks, just under 37 p/h.
But if I mark off and stay home I will take a vacation day and gross $450 for the missed day. A no brainer.